My maternal grandmother Tabata passed away from cancer in 1980. Grandfather Tabata passed away before I was born and unfortunately I never learned much about him. From what I know, both of my Tabata grandparents were from Wakayama and immigrated to Canada in the 1910’s. Grandfather Tabata was a fisherman and the family lived in...Continue reading
Author: Derek Iwanaka
Learning About Internment
Both sides of my parents’ families were interned during the war. However, since three of my grandparents passed away before I was even 10 years old, I never really had much opportunity to speak to them about their experiences. My paternal grandmother was the only one who really remembered the internment years and she lived...Continue reading
“Where Did You Come From?”
I think that most Canadians/Americans judge or assess people by their appearances first, thus for me it has always been the quickest and easiest to identify myself as Japanese or Japanese Canadian. As there were very few Asians in Coquitlam when I was in primary school, many people would ask, “Where did you come from?”...Continue reading
Post-War Racism
When I asked my parents about their internment experiences, neither of them recalled much since they were both so young during the war. As very small children, neither of them felt particularly traumatized by their internment experiences but they most certainly saw and dealt with plenty of racism afterwards. This racism towards JCs persisted for...Continue reading
Parenting
While both of my parents said they didn’t feel consciously traumatized by their internments, both of their families were quite poor before, during and after the war. My mother’s parents felt that the best way to escape poverty was for their kids to go onto post-secondary education and pursue well-paying jobs using their brains rather...Continue reading